Circle of Life*

Wow.  So I totally don't know how it went from being August and me being all "yay I forgot how much I love blogging" to December and I'm like "wtf happened to all the blogging".  Actually, that's a lie.  I know exactly how that happened.  Life is funny sometimes isn't it?  I feel like in the last 4 months I've experienced the entire circle of life...  A birth, two deaths, three marriages and a divorce.  Its been a doozy!

I have been meaning to write separate posts for all of those things.  Mainly because I feel like they are all worthy of their own posts and I certainly have enough feelings about them all to cover pages and pages (y'all know how I tend to get a little wordy).  But now that so much time has passed I feel almost overwhelmed with it all.  So we're going to do a quick brain dump so I can get out all the news and then maybe, just maybe, I'll come back and revisit some of these topics another day.

~My oldest friend Angie and her husband just had their third baby.  THIRD.  I'm not even sure how we became old enough to be parents.  Anyway, I haven't seen the baby yet, mainly because her parents live in Oregon and I'm still stuck in CA (I'm a bad friend but not THAT bad people), but hopefully I will soon.  Until then I anxiously await FB photos and the occasional post by some other family member with updates.

~Death, the first.  I've written here before about how I used to be super, super involved with a youth group at my church.  I've probably (sarcasm) even mentioned how I had a spectacular falling out with all things organized religion.  Well.  There was a time when I used to be super close to my youth pastor and his wife.  Shelly was like... an older sister.  Wiser, quieter, nicer than me.  There literally isn't a single aspect of my life I can't feel her imprint in.  My love of music, signing and performing?  Totally from Shelly.  She invited me to start a worship team in our youth group, got me an audition for our church choral group, talked me down from my nerves when performing for the first time in public, encouraged me to try out for the first of many musicals...  My passion for cooking for a group, the start of my catering career?  Absolutely traceable back to helping plan all the meals for 50 youth kids on youth retreats.  Shelly would take me with her shopping and invite me to help in the planning and even occasionally the actual cooking and prepping of meals.  For crying out loud the woman even taught me how to properly apply mascara!  Shelly lost her battle with cancer a few weeks ago and since then not a day goes by that I don't think of some other way she touched my life.

~Death, the second.  2011 was a rough year for my family.  My mom lost a niece (my cousin) and TheHusband lost an uncle and my step-father lost his only brother.  Here we were THISCLOSE to making it through 2012 with no one in the family passing away when my step-dad's father suffered a fall and passed away last week.  I didn't really know Everett but I do know my step-dad Al and I just feel terrible for him.  This was the last of his immediate family and I can't even imagine how you deal with something like that...  He and my mom have been in Kansas now for a couple of weeks and all I really want to do is give Al a big, fat hug.

~Marriages (all).  Doesn't it seem like weddings come in waves?  A former co-worker got married in Boston back in October (which I couldn't go to because of money being so tight), our neighbors next door (whom I swore were married all along - funny the assumptions you make) got married the following week and another former co-worker got married the week after that.  All with beautiful photos and epic stories and wonderful happily-ever-after type romance.  I may come back to this one because I really just feel like I can't do the weddings justice right now.  Mainly because of...

~Divorce.  Mine.  TheHusband (I'll have to come up with a new blog nickname for him now) and I have separated.  It was a long, LONG time coming.  I move in to my new apartment in two weeks.  Until then things are...  a little awkward (understatement) at the house but we're committed to getting through this with a minimal amount of fighting and with some semblance of friendship intact.  I'm angry and I'm sad.  I have good days and bad days.  But I'm doing ok.  It'll be ok.


*And now you'll have that song in your head for the rest of the day.  You're welcome.